Miles grateful, hopeful after 100th victory at LSU

(AP) — Les Miles has seen LSU win 100 games in all sorts of ways during his decade coaching the Tigers.
So while he praised the power running and clutch defense his team used to outlast Florida last weekend, Miles wasn’t inclined to hint at whether Kentucky should expect more of the same this Saturday.
“My kind of game is any game that the Tigers win, so you know. I’ll take it sliced and diced, and salad on the side,” Miles said in his typically quirky way. “It doesn’t make a difference to me.”
Milestones aside, Miles’ 10th season in Baton Rouge hasn’t been his best.
The Tigers’ first home loss to Mississippi State since 1991 was followed two weeks later by a blow-out defeat at Auburn, after which LSU fell out of the AP Top 25 poll for the first time since 2008. Such developments have plenty of LSU fans using terms like, “rebuilding year,” over the air waves and on social media.
Yet Miles entered this week with the temperament of a man who knows he has had a good run, and who is hopeful that a season which has begun with a pair of early losses in the brutal Southeastern Conference still holds the promise of “something special.”
During his regular Monday meeting with media, Miles took a moment near the end of his introductory statement to reflect on his record at LSU, which already guarantees him an average of at least 10 victories per season through 2014.
He thanked “the players that I’ve coached for these years, the assistant coaches that put our game plans together and the people on the perimeter of my building that really made a difference.”
“Frankly, you don’t have the opportunity to have the kind of success we’ve had without everything in place, and LSU gives us that,” Miles added. “So to those people, I just want to say thanks, and 100 victories is a significant piece for me and one that I will remember.”
Safety Rickey Jefferson estimated that he has known coach Les Miles for at least seven years, going back to around the time LSU recruited his older brother, Jordan, a former Tigers quarterback.
The younger Jefferson said it meant a lot to him to make a pivotal last-game interception in Florida and see his coach get a commemorative game ball from senior running back Terrence Magee after the Tigers had wrapped up their 23rd fourth-quarter comeback of the Miles era.